News filtered through my flu-addled brain...

• Sci-Am's Mind Matters blog discusses the 'out-of-body experience' research of Olaf Blanke. When the article says "they did not have the feelings of overt disembodiment that are typical of “full-blown” out-of-body experiences", what they of course mean is that they didn't have OBEs at all. You may remember me talking about this previously...
• Misreading the mind: is neurological reductionism obsolete?
• DNA molecules display telepathy-like ability.
• Area 51 gets a new name.
• NASA survey refutes drunk astronaut claims.
• Is our cosmos teeming with alien 'unmatter'?
• China finds 100,000-year-old skull. 1.3 billion people all found the same skull at the same time? That must have been a crowded excavation site.
• Shoes were worn at least 40,000 years ago. Triple-breasted suits...not so long ago.
• Scientists discover underwater mushroom species.
• Seawater spray cures kids' colds?
• Liver recipient takes on donor's immune system.
• Is China poised to take over from the U.S. as driver of the world's economy and innovation? Dubya thinks its all fei hua...yes, I learnt all my Mandarin from Firefly...although maybe Joss Whedon was more prescient than we've given him credit for. You can check out Firefly through Amazon US and UK.
• U.S. scientists close to creating artificial life. When they do, there had better be some mad professor quotes getting thrown around the room ("It's aliiiiiivee!"), or I'm gonna kick some butts.
• Brothers open Jedi church in Wales. Yoda in Welsh...that would be interesting to hear.
• Dwarves zipped in suitcases steal from long-distance luggage.
• What everyone should know about their own minds: six introspective insights from psychology.
• Ten intriguing questions.

Thanks Kat.

Quote of the Day:

If we knew the world only through synapses, how could we know the synapse?

Richard Powers